Cloud storage

The term cloud storage denotes storage space which is accessed over the Internet. Not all cloud providers score well as far as data pro­tec­tion and data secu­rity are con­cerned. A few rules will help you pro­tect your data in the cloud.

Pro­tect your­self by...

Choosing a suit­able cloud provider. Using for­eign providers often has some draw­backs with regard to your data pro­tec­tion.

Securely log­ging in. Use a secure pass­word and if pos­sible two-factor authen­ti­ca­tion, sim­ilar to the method used with e-banking.

Only ever trans­mit­ting your data in encrypted form. Use a ser­vice which trans­mits your data in encrypted form (https).

Cre­ating an addi­tional local back-up of your data. Reg­u­larly create local back-ups of your data stored in the cloud - you are gen­er­ally unable to check that your cloud provider backs up your data cor­rectly either.

When using cloud storage such as Dropbox, iCloud, OneDrive or Google Drive, your data are stored in cen­tral loca­tions via the public Internet. You are there­fore passing on your data to a third party. This raises con­cerns with regard to secu­rity and data pro­tec­tion.

Cloud provider loca­tion

The cloud provider’s loca­tion is vital: Your data are often stored abroad and are there­fore sub­ject to dif­ferent data pro­tec­tion laws. In addi­tion, many data on the Internet are sys­tem­at­i­cally recorded and analysed by intel­li­gence ser­vices.

According to law, storage and reten­tion of data is also a form of data pro­cessing and hence sub­ject to data pro­tec­tion.

Using cloud ser­vices there­fore becomes par­tic­u­larly crit­ical if third party per­sonal data requiring spe­cial pro­tec­tion are stored with a cloud provider. Depending on the envi­ron­ment, this can quickly lead to a breach of the local data pro­tec­tion reg­u­la­tions (DSG) or the stricter Euro­pean Gen­eral Data Pro­tec­tion Reg­u­la­tions (GDPR).

To pre­vent poten­tial con­flicts with the data pro­tec­tion laws, you should there­fore prefer­ably opt for a Swiss provider.

Secure access

You either access your cloud data via your browser by calling up your provider web­site and log­ging your­self in there. Or you use a pro­gram or app installed on your device pro­viding you with access to your ser­vice.

The point of access is the vul­ner­a­bility here: A weak pass­word throws the gates wide open to attackers. It is there­fore an absolute must to follow our “6 rules for a secure pass­word”. If pos­sible, use two-factor authen­ti­ca­tion, sim­ilar to the method used with e-banking, to better pro­tect access.

When accessing the cloud via smart­phone or tablet, your data are only as secure as the level of pro­tec­tion against access to your device and the cloud ser­vice in case of loss or theft. Fur­ther infor­ma­tion can be found here. Access via unse­cured net­works - i.e. Wi-Fi - also poses a risk.

Secure data trans­mis­sion

Use a ser­vice which trans­mits your data in encrypted form and pre­vents unau­tho­rised access by third par­ties during trans­mis­sion this way.

In your browser, this is the case if your address line starts with “https://”, and a lock symbol is dis­played. If you use a cloud ser­vice via soft­ware or an app installed, you must ensure that your data are trans­mitted via an encrypted con­nec­tion via your con­fig­u­ra­tion set­tings.

Secure data storage

With cloud storage, you entrust third par­ties with the storage of your data. For this reason, it is vital to pay par­tic­ular atten­tion to data back-ups and data encryp­tion.

Most cloud providers now offer the option to file your data in encrypted form. Yet while this is gen­er­ally easy and con­ve­nient to handle, it is just about impos­sible to check how reli­able this is. The most secure method there­fore is to encrypt and decrypt at least your sen­si­tive data your­self.

Secure back-up

You are gen­er­ally unable to check that your cloud provider backs up your data cor­rectly either. For this reason, you should make absolutely sure that you create local back-ups of all your data stored in the cloud, too. Fur­ther infor­ma­tion can be found here.

Secure devices

If your device is infected with mal­ware, your data are not secure in the cloud either and are liable to attack. You should there­fore follow our “5 steps for your dig­ital secu­rity“.

Cloud provider

There are a large number of cloud providers all over the world: Some exam­ples:

With cloud storage, data are stored in cen­tral places via the public Internet. This saves storage space and enables access to your data from any loca­tion and with dif­ferent devices, even by sev­eral people at the same time.

Passing on per­sonal data to third par­ties how­ever can poten­tially adversely affect your data secu­rity and raises con­cerns with regard to data pro­tec­tion. It is there­fore vital to make the right choice of provider.

You might also be interested in these articles:

4 – Pro­tecting online access

WLAN

1 – Backing up data

Secure data storage

5 steps for your dig­ital secu­rity

External storage media

3 – Pre­venting with soft­ware updates

Social media and net­works

Pro­tected data access

What else would you like to learn about security when e-banking?

Reg­ister for a course now
and learn more:

Basic courses

This basic course will point out cur­rent threats on the Internet and con­veys mea­sures as to how you can pro­tect your­self by taking some simple mea­sures.

Prac­tical courses

Sub­scribe to our newsletter:

As a general rule, you will receive a summary of all «eBanking – but secure!» news once a month. This newsletter will be useful if there is no need for you to stay informed in real time, but would not like to miss out on any important information on e-banking and security either.

We may request cookies to be set on your device. We use cookies to let us know when you visit our websites, how you interact with us, to enrich your user experience, and to customize your relationship with our website.

Click on the different category headings to find out more. You can also change some of your preferences. Note that blocking some types of cookies may impact your experience on our websites and the services we are able to offer.

Essential Website Cookies

These cookies are strictly necessary to provide you with services available through our website and to use some of its features.

Because these cookies are strictly necessary to deliver the website, refuseing them will have impact how our site functions. You always can block or delete cookies by changing your browser settings and force blocking all cookies on this website. But this will always prompt you to accept/refuse cookies when revisiting our site.

We fully respect if you want to refuse cookies but to avoid asking you again and again kindly allow us to store a cookie for that. You are free to opt out any time or opt in for other cookies to get a better experience. If you refuse cookies we will remove all set cookies in our domain.

We provide you with a list of stored cookies on your computer in our domain so you can check what we stored. Due to security reasons we are not able to show or modify cookies from other domains. You can check these in your browser security settings.

Check to enable permanent hiding of message bar and refuse all cookies if you do not opt in. We need 2 cookies to store this setting. Otherwise you will be prompted again when opening a new browser window or new a tab.

Click to enable/disable essential site cookies.

Other external services

We also use different external services like Google Webfonts, Google Maps, and external Video providers. Since these providers may collect personal data like your IP address we allow you to block them here. Please be aware that this might heavily reduce the functionality and appearance of our site. Changes will take effect once you reload the page.

Google Webfont Settings:

Click to enable/disable Google Webfonts.

Google Map Settings:

Click to enable/disable Google Maps.

Google reCaptcha Settings:

Click to enable/disable Google reCaptcha.

Vimeo and Youtube video embeds:

Click to enable/disable video embeds.

Privacy Policy

You can read about our cookies and privacy settings in detail on our Privacy Policy Page.